Arenas Of Language Use

When we think of the ways we use language we think of facetofaceconversations telephone conversations reading and writing and even talkingto oneself. These are ... » 

When we think of the ways we use language we think of facetofaceconversations telephone conversations reading and writing and even talkingto oneself. These are arenas of language usetheaters of action in whichpeople do things with language. But what exactly are they doing with language?What are their goals and intentions? By what processes do they achieve thesegoals? In these twelve essays Herbert H. Clark and his colleagues discuss thecollective nature of languagethe ways in which people coordinate with eachother to determine the meaning of what they say.According to Clark in order for one person to understand another there mustbe a common ground of knowledge between them. He shows how people infer thiscommon ground from their past conversations their immediate surroundingsand their shared cultural background. Clark also discusses the means by whichspeakers design their utterances for particular audiences and coordinate theiruse of language with other participants in a language arena. He argues thatlanguage use in conversation is a collaborative process where speaker andlistener work together to establish that the listener understands the speakersmeaning. Since people often use words to mean something quite different fromthe dictionary definitions of those words Clark offers a realistic perspectiveon how speakers and listeners coordinate on the meanings of words.This collection presents outstanding examples of Clarks pioneering work on thepragmatics of language use and it will interest psychologists linguistscomputer scientists and philosophers. «